Guest: Isa Blumi. We discuss the war in Yemen, the recent attacks on Saudi oil facilities, the ground operation in Najran, some recent, perhaps game changing statements by Saudi crown prince Mohammad bin Salman, and other comments made by the Saudi energy minister and by Russian and Iranian officials at the Valdai conference. Isa talks about what he describes in his book as the “shifting causal factor behind the ongoing violence in Yemen”, the need for resources, the coalition infighting and the worsening predicament of the Saudi Kingdom and their frenemies in the Gulf. At the root of it is a fragmenting, collapsing empire and global financial interests plundering the world.
Dr. Isa Blumi is an historian, an author and an Associate Professor at Stockholm University. His very prescient book, titled Destroying Yemen: What Chaos in Arabia Tells Us about the World tells the story of the wars in Yemen but also “ultimately tells an even larger story of today’s political economy of global capitalism, development, and the war on terror as disparate actors intersect in Arabia.”
FOLLOW Isa Blumi @IsaBlumi and find his latest book at UCPress.edu.
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Recorded on October 4, 2019. Music by Fluorescent Grey.
Reference Links:
- Destroying Yemen: What Chaos in Arabia Tells Us about the World, Isa Blumi, UC Press
- Around the Empire: Ep 55 Imperial War, Gulf State Rivalry, Resources and Resistance in Yemen feat Isa Blumi
- Around the Empire: Ep 64 Yemen War Big Picture & Media Narrative feat Isa Blumi